


Second Impressions

by justhuman



Category: SG-1 - Pern Fusion (with some some SGA for good measure)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-29
Updated: 2011-06-29
Packaged: 2017-10-20 21:00:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/217046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justhuman/pseuds/justhuman
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Did I mention that this is !crack? Good. Now that we have that out of the way -- Harper Daniel has been recruited for a special project at Benden Weyr and finds more than he bargained for.</p><p>Pairings: This one's hard to characterize. Arguably it's Jack/Daniel, but maybe not what you expect.  There's a lot of mentions of other "canon" and non-canon pairings.  Look it wasn't up to me -- the dragon always chooses.<br/></p>
            </blockquote>





	Second Impressions

Second Impressions  


 _Ten Weeks Ago -- Benden Weyr_

Daniel handed up two sacks of firestone and a skin of water to a blue rider that he didn't recognize. There was something in the rider's voice that made Daniel think that the man was from Igen--which made sense, since Igen was flying the Fall with Benden. With a nod of thanks, the rider tossed Daniel the half-empty skin, which was the cue for Daniel to back away from the flap of the massive dragon's wings. Dragon and rider made it halfway up the walls of Benden Weyr and then vanished in the blink of an eye. Daniel made his way back toward the piles of firestone and tossed the blue rider's empty bags to the weyrlings that were busy refilling the sacks.

"Shards! Why you throwing rocks at me?"

Daniel turned and could see that his bags hadn't landed innocently on the pile of firestones, but on the annoying and annoyed master smith. One of the bags must have had a stone caught in the bottom. "I'm sorry, Rodney, I didn't see you. Speaking of which, where's Carson?"

"Why should I know? He's probably bandaging someone," Rodney said, digging through the pile of firestone.

Daniel looked toward the edges of the weyr bowl and did see Carson working with a green dragon who had a Thead-scored foreleg.

Harper, healer, and smith -- all were accounted for, not that it was Daniel's job to account for them. Then Daniel frowned. "Rodney, why is it that you look like you're part of the firestone pile?"

The master smith was covered in gray dust as if he had fallen asleep on a mountain and it had grown around him. Daniel considered that that was an interesting idea for a song--not necessarily the basis of a teaching song, but an entertainment for the winter months. He would have to write it down when he went back to the lower caverns after the --

"I'm talking to you, harper!"

Rodney's shout pulled him out of his musing. "Sorry," Daniel said. "I was just thinking --"

"And that's the problem with your craft, always gathering wherry down instead of actually doing anything practical. I on the other hand am trying to find a way to heat cot and hold with a lump of firestone. If my theories are correct, which they should be, I'll --"

"Wait! In the middle of the Fall, you're working on an invention instead of lending a hand to assist the dragonmen?"

"What do you think the best use of my talents is, to fill bags with rocks? My craft has important work to be doing at all times…"

Daniel deliberately tuned him out. He had this argument practically on a daily basis with the man. Unlike Master Smith Fandarel, who could appreciate the harper skills of teaching, communicating and managing the sometimes delicate relationships between hold, craft and weyr, Rodney seemed completely lost in his own world of science and machine. To be sure, the man had earned the title of master, with his brilliant work in his craft, but sometimes that did not outweigh the fact that the man could be an ass.

Before Daniel could point that out, again, Rodney had grabbed two firestone stacks and was rushing up to a bronze rider. It was Sh'pard, Lorneth's rider. Daniel shouldered two more sacks of firestone and chided himself. It did seem that familiarity bred contempt. He had been forced to work with Rodney day in and day out in the rooms of the Ancients in the oldest parts of Benden Weyr. When they finally reached records that seemed more about living things, Carson had joined their merry band of crafters in the depths of the weyr.

As a master harper with a specialty in records, it was Daniel's responsibility to organize and transcribe the records, trying to reconstruct the thought patterns of the Ancients. Rodney tried to decipher their innovations. Carson, of course, sought information that could be applied to healing. Daniel knew full well that Rodney blustered the most when he was tired, frustrated or frightened.

There was softening of Rodney's expression and body language as he handed up the firestone to Sh'pard. Daniel knew it all too well from his short-lived marriage to Sharee, who had died with their first child during birthing. Life had become better over the last year as Daniel plunged more deeply into his craft, but he could not help the small flush of jealousy and self-pity as he watched the lovers touch. Sh'pard and Rodney were good for one another. The dragonman tempered and diffused the worst of the smith's obsession to his craft. In turn, Rodney brought Sh'pard from his shell.

Dragonman born from an egg, Daniel mused. It was another story idea that he'd have to write down when he was done with this important duty of supporting the weyr during a fall. He moved to a farther landing zone, away from the lovers, waiting for the next dragon and rider to fly down for resupply and succor.

A bronze popped from _between_ , above the Star Stones, and began flying toward the bowl, but even without the trained eye of someone born in the weyr, Daniel knew something was wrong. The golden body of a queen and her rider appeared right behind the bronze, bugling distress as the bronze foundered too fast toward the weyr lake. Some of the older blues and greens, who flew support during the fall, raced toward the falling beast and tried to break his speed.

 _Help S'ra!_

Daniel didn't know who had recognized the dragon and rider. It didn't matter; he dropped his firestone sacks and ran with everyone else toward the lake. The rider was draped over the great bronze neck, being held only by the fighting straps.

The injuries to the great bronze came more into focus. The right wing was a Thread-scored mess of ichor and membrane. The great wing was extended, but there was little to catch the wind and land them safely to ground. Despite the attempts at help from the agile blues and greens, the bronze tumbled toward the earth.

 _S'ra!_

It came out clearer than most of the shouted entreaties that Daniel heard from the people around him, as S'ra's dragon, Jacketh, spun in midair and skidded on his belly and limbs into the lake, absorbing the crash and keeping his rider away from the ground.

The rest of the crowd beat him to the rider, who was being cut from the straps and pulled off. Daniel went in the opposite direction, wading into the shallow part of the lake. He had a jar of numbweed ointment slung around his neck and began slathering it as best he could over the horrid mess of Jacketh's wing.

The scene was chaos and Daniel was in mortal danger from the still moving wing as Jacketh frantically tried to support his bulk on his legs while he moved out of the lake toward his rider.Everyone was demanding to know what had happened. All of Pern knew of S'ra and Jacketh. After Mirrim had impressed Path, a green dragon, there had been wild arguments about the suitability of making girls candidates for impression to the dragons other than queens, but all the talk came to naught.

Daniel had been a journeyman, lucky enough to be at Master Robinton's side, during the impression where Sara had been presented as a candidate for the queen egg. In that same clutch was Jacketh's egg. Everyone in the galleries had marveled as a young bronze cracked his shell, stumbled past every male candidate and practically scattered the young women waiting for the queen egg. Daniel's eyes unfocused, and he clutched the great wing for support as a great bellow of pain filled the weyr, drowning out all sound.

 _The scene jumped and moved almost drunkenly, past boy after boy, not intending to step on them, but hard not to. The humans on the terraces seemed upset, but there was the crooning of many dragons. The females were all turned toward a golden egg._

 _'I'm hungry.'_

 _Several girls turn their heads nervously with fear in their eyes, but the one turned with curiosity._

 _'You want a boy.'_

 _The scene focused in tightly on the One, on S'ra. There was love and wonderment and finally the missing piece._

 _'Will you become a male?'_

 _She laughed so loud that she did not care that the queen egg was cracking._

 _'I will not!'_

 _Her hands slowly moved to eye ridges and snout._

 _'Then I do not want a boy. I want food. I am Jacketh; and I am hungry.' If eye ridges could be scratched while food was consumed, there would be nothing better._

 _'Then I am Sara - I mean S'ra, and I am amazed.'_

Daniel lurched against the beast, sensing the horror that he was now a part of. He could not see S'ra, but knew that the end was near and could feel things racing away from him, could feel the life ebbing from Sharee's hand and the light from her eyes. He shouted, "No! Don't leave me again!"

There was a terrible thunder as every dragon in the weyr bugled at once.

Jacketh collapsed again and did not move.

"What have you done?" a woman's scream tore through the bowl of the weyr, the golden queen Samanth's bugle echoing Janet's distress.

Daniel realized that he was the only one up against the extended wing, which was covered in numbweed. Jacketh's great bulk did not move, so Daniel stepped beneath the great wing and moved toward his head.

Janet was being held back from a shocked Rodney, who was holding some strange device; it was a replica of something in the records. With him was Master Healer Carson. He tried to reassure Benden's junior weyrwoman.

"It's simply to relieve the dragon's pain. I've been working on ways to deliver fellis juice more effectively to patients who cannot drink. Rodney used this device -- "

"It's a syringe."

"Whatever it's called," Carson said, "it put the sedative directly into the dragon's blood. Look, he still breathes! Now we can work on his wing without the painful flailing."

"By Faranth's shell! Don't you know what you've done?" screamed Janet.

The men just stared as Janet turned away. The crowd that had formed behind her parted, revealing S'ra's torn body, lying on the ground. Janet collapsed beside her, and Daniel suddenly knew.

Lovingly Janet touched the body of her weyrmate. Jacketh had flown Samanth in her last two mating flights.

"She's dead," Janet whispered, but everyone heard her because of the impenetrable silence that overtook the weyr. She began to cry uncontrollably and shouted again, "What have you done!"

The women in the crowd circled Janet, taking her away from S'ra body. Suddenly Daniel found himself receiving glares intended for Carson and Rodney, who was were obviously still confused. The dragonfolk were separating themselves from the interference of the outsiders.

"I was only trying to help," Carson said, his voice raspy with guilt.

Daniel knew it to be true and put a reassuring hand on the man's shoulder.

"But--I don't--" Rodney sputtered, even more confused. "The syringe worked. It did what we intended."

Daniel put an arm around the man's shoulder, turning him away from the angry weyrfolk.

"Rodney, Jacketh's rider is dead. When he wakes from the potion, he will go _between_ ," Carson said.

Rodney's eyes flew open.

"The grief of the weyr will be overwhelming at the loss of rider and dragon," Daniel said. "It's bad enough when they both go at once."

"And through our goodwill," Carson said bitterly, "they will have to live the pain twice." Without another word, Carson snatched up his kit and walked over to the damaged wing.

"What's he doing?" Rodney asked.

"I'm not sure," Daniel replied, and the two men joined their comrade.

"Carson, you just reminded me that he's not going to--" Rodney started.

"It doesn't matter. We acted too quickly, and I have to do something. Maybe it will just give him more lift." Carson took out needle and thread.

Daniel saw an older rider approaching them, pain in his eyes. Making a decision, Daniel unslung the pot of numbweed from over his shoulder and handed it to Rodney. Then he began walking toward the approaching dragonfolk.

"Where are you going?" demanded Rodney.

"To do the important work of my craft. I'm going to negotiate with these fine people to let you and Carson do what must be done."

* Several Hours Later*

A wineskin interrupted Daniel's view of the bulk of the sleeping dragon.

"Couldn't you find a more comfortable place to sit?" asked Robinton.

"Master," Daniel said. He started to get to his feet, but Robinton waved him down and sat on the boulder that Daniel had been leaning against.

"Would you mind telling me how it became the duty of the Harper Hall to placate Benden Weyr and its weyrwomen tonight?"

"As you know, Master--"

"Don't act like an errant apprentice when we both know what you are."

"I am a sad excuse for a harper?" Daniel put on a sad smile at their familiar conversation. "I have acceptable, but no better, skill at the dulcimer, and no singing voice at all."

"Your copying skills are also questionable. Thank the First Egg you had some little talent in being hidebound." Robinton let a full measure of sarcasm into his voice. "But it is your voice that is at the heart of this discussion. You know how to talk to people."

"They did nothing wrong. It was simply impossible for them to see beyond a dragon. I couldn't let the weyrfolk act in haste, because what Rodney and Carson did was brilliant. I only wish my hidebound head had been able to decipher what they were doing with those record skins before they acted."

Robinton finished a long pull on the wineskin and handed it to Daniel. "It's not as if I can fault you for not being able to sort out a smith -- I can't even drink one under the table. And healers, well, they are plainspoken, but say things a man does not want to hear."

Daniel looked up, and Robinton winked at him. "Let us return to my point. If you could stop the weyrfolk from mortally wounding the smith and the healer, how is that I had to convince Lessa that they didn't actually score rider or dragon and rider with Thread? Really, I find your negotiation skills half done."

Daniel laughed. "If I were to have done it right, Master--"

"There you go again."

"I would have denied you Benden wine." Daniel downed a swig of the wine.

"While that is true, you're a terrible liar. At least you've moved from errant apprentice to conniving journeyman. What will you do to prove your mastery of our craft?"

"I will find out how those two managed to sedate a dragon. Of course, to do that I will have to convince the weyrfolk to let Carson and Rodney stay. They are good, very good."

"And we are sitting in the dirt because?"

"Well, you are sitting on a rock. I, on the other hand, am a master of records. I will use my skills to record and write this lament. Of course those of you with more _expected_ skill will fiddle with it until it is fit for man and beast to hear."

Robinton gave a sad laugh and nodded as he took back the wineskin.

Daniel frowned. "Although the story I'll tell might be richer if I knew what happened."

Finishing his sip, Robinton said, "S'ra had a blood child that came to Benden with her. As you'd expect, he fostered in the lower caverns and eventually stood on the hatching grounds. Ch'lie impressed a brown, Cubth. I am told that they were flying too low over some softwood trees and miscalculated the Threadfall. His mother..."

Daniel imagined a young boy on massive brown. _A shadow crossed over them -- S'ra and Jacketh flaming and taking score after score…_ Daniel felt a shiver run through him. "Did they save Ch'lie and Cubth?"

"No." Robinton raised the wineskin again, but before he could drink, both men rose to their feet as the great bronze bulk began to stir.

A croon reverberated against the high stone walls of Benden. It reminded Daniel of an Impression, but there was no anticipation or joy in the sounds the dragons made now. It was all sympathy and pain. The sound strummed through Daniel's consciousness, as if the grief the dragons felt played him like an instrument. "Sharee."

Robinton put a firm hand on Daniel's shoulder. "They are with him," Robinton said.

Jacketh threw his head into the air and belched a long gout of flame and then bugled all the pain that Daniel was reliving. In his mind he saw the sweat-stained face of his beloved and felt her desperate hold on his hand.

Jacketh's great bronze head swung down to within a foot of the two men. Robinton stumbled back a step, but Daniel felt pinned by the great whirling eye. It was as if Daniel had forgotten how to breathe for a moment or two. Finally, he sucked in some air, pushing his grief away. He had survived that terrible moment and it could not lay him low now.

Daniel wanted to know what the dragon wanted of him. He felt another loss creeping through his bones. Jacketh turned his head and belched up his second stomach, leaving a stinking pile of firestone on the weyr floor. The dragons were crooning as he flapped and pushed off the ground, unsteadily because of the wing that was a patchwork of thread and membrane.

There would be a great scream; Daniel had heard it before. But the only scream was that of a herdbeast. Jacketh had gone to the feeding grounds and was devouring a meal, his wounded wing half folded over his back.

* Now *

Daniel sipped the strong and bitter klah as he made his way across the weyr bowl. He had been up half the night wrestling with some records that he simply could not make sense of. No doubt Rodney would have thoughts about them, but he had retired at a more reasonable time of the night. Sh'peth had dragged him out of the ancient rooms and presumably back to his weyr for a tryst.

Carson might have been able to make heads or tails of it, but he had gone to his sleeping furs at about the same time. Daniel paused in his walk, and remembered that Carson had shared an interesting glance with both Rodney and Sh'peth. Daniel grunted as he smiled and took a sip of his klah. He had apparently been left out. At least he had been too hidebound to notice the previous night.

 _I am hungry._

"Me too," Daniel muttered. "I've got some meatrolls; that will keep me as I go back to the records."

 _You read too much._

Daniel laughed. "It is my craft." He spun completely around, wondering who had spoken to him. There was no one there. He turned again and found himself facing the feeding grounds and Jacketh. An untrained eye might have missed the dragon, because its color was all wrong--pasty brown like the stone instead of the bronze it should be. The body was longer than most dragons', but not as broad, and the wings were folded in, so Daniel couldn't confirm the Thread scars, but this was Jacketh -- the riderless dragon.

Almost as if Jacketh had heard his thoughts, he stretched out his damaged wing. It had been ten weeks since the tragedy. The wing was healing, but it would take much more time for the membrane to fully repair itself -- not that it should, because there shouldn't be such a thing as a riderless dragon.

 _They say that women should not ride bronzes._

"Well that's true too," Daniel said aloud, and then wondered what people would think if they found him talking to himself. There had been much consternation when S'ra had impressed Jacketh. Dragonriders and holders alike were lamenting the loss of a bronze in their ranks, because a woman had no place being a wingleader or wingsecond. It was one thing for Mirrim to have impressed a green -- a green was a female, after all -- and women did impress golds. Not that they had that attitude when Mirrim had impressed. They did not even want to give S'ra the honor of contracting her name.

S'ra and Jacketh had other ideas and simply pushed their way into the natural role and rank within the weyr. As Daniel understood it from the Benden riders, the dragons hadn't cared at all about it. Jacketh was fast and strong, and with his rider, they were good to follow. The people came around more slowly, and ultimately lost any argument when Jacketh flew Samanth, one of the junior queens in Benden Weyr. No one argued with a queen dragon except another queen.

Daniel found his mind racing again to that night, but shook himself out of it. For weeks he'd been dreaming this nightmare, his brain filling in the detail of what it must feel like to bank and turn to flame and go _between_. "I want a happy story for a change," he said aloud.

 _Daniel's breath caught as he dived, dived, dived into the crashing waves. It was impossible to believe that he wouldn’t be crushed by the water, but instead he was surrounded by the cool and wet, tasting salt as he practically swallowed an enormous fish whole._

He stumbled a bit and regained his footing with a frown and said, "I am hungry."

There was a trumpeting of a dragon so close that Daniel jumped to the side. The only question was who was mocking him -- the rider T'ealc or his bronze beast Cameroth. T'ealc swung down as Cameroth powered through to the feeding grounds, snatching up a beast.

"You were too lost in thought, Harper Daniel! What held your attention so that your thoughts were kept from me?" T'ealc exclaimed with just the hint of a leer in his voice.

Daniel smiled. Since he had come to the weyr, T'ealc had sought him out on occasion, sharing a meal, a wineskin and sometimes the sleeping furs. The arrangement was about convenience and friendship with no long-term goals. Indeed, Cameroth and Lorneth were the front-runners for Samanth's next flight.

"T'ealc, it is good to see you. I was just noticing..." Daniel trailed off because it was obvious that T'ealc was listening to Cameroth.

Then T'ealc wrapped an arm around Daniel's shoulders and turned him away from Jacketh. "You know we try not to speak of him. He upsets dragon and rider alike. It is one thing for a queen like old Nemorth to have stayed with her eggs until they hatched, but this, this is unprecedented. He does not even eat!"

"He did eat for a week or two after…" Daniel let the thought trail, not needing to explain it further.

"That should not have happened," T'ealc said too quickly; then he shook his head. "Please do not think of me as heartless -- "

Cameroth bugled in obvious dissent at the thought.

"It's just that -- " He held his hand out toward his mount, and Daniel could read the unconditional love in T'ealc's eyes. "I cannot explain it to someone who has not known the same."

"You don't have to, T'ealc, but I'm curious." Daniel inclined his head in Jacketh's direction.

 _You are always curious._

T'ealc said, "As you said, for a while he did eat and heal. No one knows what made him stop, any more than they know what made him stay. The other dragons were uncomfortable trying to speak to him, and he wouldn't answer anyway."

"I've been afraid to ask, since it might be construed as interference in weyr issues. However, Lessa, she can speak -- "

"To all the dragons, yes, but not to one that doesn't wish to respond. He has been perched on that rock for near sixty days. It was when Keteth flew last. All the bronzes blooded their kill except for _him_. They flew after the golden one, and he flew to that perch. I swear he'll become a stone!" T'ealc, normally a model of stoicism, had let his voice rise as he contemplated the situation. It was indeed upsetting for dragon and rider.

While they spoke, another bronze landed nearby. Sh'peth dismounted, sent Lorneth to the feeding grounds, and joined them. "And what an bad perch it is. That's the tunnel that the dragonets will travel after Impression tonight."

"Tonight!" T'ealc shouted. "Have you seen a shell rock?"

"Vala and Keteth are telling everyone it will happen tonight," Sh'peth laughed. "And I wouldn't make a bet against those two."

Daniel smiled. Vala's good fortune at games of chance was well known, and on more than one occasion, her methods had been questioned.

"I can't help it. I've been writing about S'ra and Jacketh's last ride. Every time I walk across the bowl, I am...inspired? Maybe 'haunted' is the word."

"You harpers!" Sh'peth exclaimed. "You should focus on happy things, like the hatching that will happen -- "

"Now! Shards to that Vala and her luck!" T'ealc said. "Cameroth is receiving orders from three queens and Lessa all at once."

"Can the dragons tell them apart? Do they have distinct voices in the head?" Daniel mused out loud.

 _They all have claws, but Lessa is the dangerous one_ was the amused response Daniel got, although in the flurry of movement, he couldn't tell which of his companions had spoken. He couldn't ask because they were already mounting their dragons.

They were no doubt off to craft and hold to bring back lords, masters and fathers to watch their children try to Impress. Always quick with a plan, Daniel checked his pack and found his meatrolls and record papers in order. He'd reach the viewing ledges early enough to have a good place to observe both dragons and people.

Once inside, Daniel debated the most advantageous viewing. The high ledges where the weyrleaders and the bronzes would observe were always good, and it wouldn't be difficult to obtain that view once he ran into a dragonrider that he knew. Still, he had seen several hatchings from that height and desired something different. For a contrast he would have really loved to be on the sands with the candidates, but that simply wasn't proper.

Looking for the next best thing, he worked his way down the switchbacks and carved stairs to the lowest tier of the gallery, a few feet off the sands. There he had a perfect view of the main clutch of eggs and the golden queen egg that Keteth had rolled away for special attention. With a nod to the golden queen, Daniel pulled out a bundle of records and began reading.

In under an hour the gallery was buzzing with voices of holder, crafter and weyrfolk. The dragons, lining the ledges of the hatching ground, bugled as one. From the far side of the hot sands, young men and women in white tunics began filing out and taking their places in half-circles around the eggs. Daniel knew that he should roll up his hides, but his brain was nagging at a smeared piece of text.

 _You think too much._

Daniel looked around to give a goodhearted reply in harper fashion -- though he was always annoyed with people telling him to stop reading. But the crowd was taken with a collective gasp. From the main entrance, the stone dragon flew in. Jacketh circled the grounds once, dipping a wing to Keteth, and then he landed on the hot sands. There were discontented noises from the dragons ringing the hatching grounds.

Now Daniel was sorry that he had not obtained a place next to the weyrleaders. There was definitely a commotion on those upper ledges. At least Master Robinton would be able to tell him of the conversation later. Turning his attention back to Jacketh, Daniel saw that he had settled into the sand, as if he was going to sleep, pulling himself into a tight oblong ball, even wrapping his tail about his body to conceal its length.

Keteth let out a load bugle and every dragon and person stopped to look at her. From outside the hatching grounds, there were answering bugles.

 _Ramoth and Samanth_ , thought Daniel, although he wasn't sure how he drew that conclusion.

Almost immediately the people began to whisper again, but the dragons seemed content with whatever Keteth's pronouncement was. Daniel could see F'lar and Lessa along with several of the old-timer weyrleaders. Oh to be a fire-lizard on Master Robinton's shoulder. The old-timers were definitely more agitated than F'lar or Lessa -- but perhaps they were simply hiding it better. Truly all manner of tradition-breaking practice or wonder seemed to originate in Benden Weyr. Lessa flew back in time four hundred years. Browns tried to fly queens. Lord holders cracked white dragons from their shells. Women impressed gold, green and bronze.

S'ra had been the final straw. There had been considerable consternation that a woman should be a wingleader, to say nothing of how the weyrleaders new and old faced the idea that Jacketh would pursue a golden queen like any other bronze, placing S'ra in position to be a mate to a queen's rider. Daniel found it astonishingly hypocritical considering the relationships that male green riders enjoyed with their brown and blue weyrmates. In the end, the weyr adjusted, with the none too gentle urgings of the senior and junior weyrwomen: Lessa, Ramoth's rider; Janet, Samanth's rider; and Vala, Keteth's rider. Indeed, no bronze besides Mnementh would fly Ramoth, so the weyr leadership was not at risk. Jacketh did fly Samanth, Janet's gold, and both women found a lasting love.

Now a dragon that shouldn't be was resting on the hatching grounds just beyond the eggs. Daniel would never be able to complain that his ballad didn't have plenty of material. There was no more time for thinking, though, because the eggs began to crack. One after another the new dragonets emerged from their shells, awkward and needy. One by one they paired off -- Impressed. The new little queen chose a girl of Lemos Hold. Daniel had heard the whisper of names and was trying to place the right one on the brown-haired girl.

The disappointed boys were already on their way out the tunnel they came in as the boy-dragonet couples made their way through the tunnel to the feeding grounds. Normally the crowd would have begun to dissipate, but Jacketh was still lying on the ground. Daniel had to wonder if he would approach one of the unchosen girls.

 _No. I am not looking for a girl._

Daniel turned his head from side to side because it seemed like the comment must have been directed at him, even though he hadn't asked anything out loud. The crowd gasped once again and Daniel frowned as everyone started backing away from the edge of the tier.

Something hard hit his hand and he lost his grip on the wher-hide records that he had never managed to put away.

"Shards!" Daniel shouted as he was spun around, only to be face to retreating tail. Jacketh was flying a lazy circle around the hatching ground, obviously getting much too close to the crowd. While most people quickly made their way toward the tunnels, Daniel looked forlornly at the hides on the hatching-ground sands.

Without considering it any further, he jumped down a snatched the nearest one up, trying to quickly follow the trail of records. He counted each hide as he picked it up, and with one more to go, he was face-to-snout with a dusty bronze dragon -- with _the_ bronze dragon. His document was peeking out from beneath Jacketh's foreleg.

"I don't suppose anyone can convince him to move -- that wher-hide is very important." Daniel's voice lost volume as he spoke, and his brain caught up with the immediate situation.

 _You could ask._

"Of course!" Daniel said. "I'll just ask the dragon, because they're renowned for talking to just anyone." Never taking his eye from the whirling eye in front of him, Daniel wondered if this was one of those cases where one was supposed to curl into a ball and play dead or to try to appear bigger.

There was a lot of noise in the hatching grounds. Shouts to get out of there, shouts to do something about the mad beast. Very clearly, the strangest laugh Daniel had ever heard filled his head.

 _Please! Make yourself bigger than a dragon!_

"Fine, that wasn't the best logic, but I'm standing in front of a dragon that hasn't eaten in six or seven weeks."

 _I am hungry._

"Of course he's hungry. Would someone let him know that harpers are tough or stringy or something along -- " Daniel's head tilted to the side as he frowned. "Did you say _I'm_ hungry?"

Jacketh turned his head to the side, mirroring Daniel's head tilt, but moving to a full ninety degrees.

 _I am hungry._

"The hunger issue we have established, but are you actually talking to me?"

Jacketh continued turning his head until it was upside down. _I am thinking, and you are listening. You are also talking. Many are looking at you oddly._

"At me! I -- " Daniel looked around and realized that things had become very quiet. He cleared his throat and concentrated on thinking, loudly. _Maybe I wouldn't look so odd if you would turn your head the correct way._ Daniel couldn't decide if he was caught up in wonder or illness as Jacketh actually turned his head back to right.

 _I am still hungry._ Jacketh's eyes glowed a little red.

 _I still want my wher-hide._

Jacketh took a step to the side, removing his weight from Daniel's wher-hide.

Daniel started reaching for it, but then stood up, realizing that he'd essentially be crawling under a dragon to get it. He realized that he was being an idiot, because Jacketh was just teasing him and would never hurt him. He didn't know why that was true, but it was. Daniel bent over and picked up his hide.

"Thank you," Daniel said as he reached up with his other hand and scratched at Jacketh's eye ridges. There might have been a gasp or outcry, but Daniel didn't care.

Jacketh's long tongue shot out like a whip and glanced over Daniel's cheek. _Tasty_.

Daniel's fingers paused as he remembered the scene of S'ra impressing Jacketh and his musings about having his eye ridges scratched while eating a meal.

 _You're lying. You won't eat me._

Jacketh pushed his head into Daniel's hand further. _Yes, I lied. I would never eat you. But I'm still hungry. I also itch._

 _Not bathing for weeks will do that._

 _Eating is more important._

 _I'm not in a position to judge._

 _Yes, you are._

 _Jacketh._

 _Dan-iel. That is too long._

 _Jack?_

 _D'niel._

 _D'niel -- that's a dragonrider's name. I'm a harper._

 _You cannot sing._

"I can sing!" Daniel shouted. A short laugh from one of the high tiers made Daniel look up. Master Robinton.

"At the very least I have more than passable skills with several instruments. And I -- "

 _Read too much._

"You've said that before."

 _You have still not listened._

Daniel frowned, as all the dreams and nightmares of the last few weeks came back to him -- all his inspiration.

 _I am inspiring._ Jacketh straightened proudly.

"Ja -- " Daniel cut himself off. He was really having a conversation with a dragon.

 _We have been having a conversation for longer than it takes a queen to mate and for the eggs to hatch. I thought perhaps the hot sands were necessary for humans to understand._

The sands were hot; Daniel was lucky that he had put on riding boots that morning.

 _For someone who thinks too much, you do not think fast. I will wait, but --_

"I know -- you're hungry. Are you're trying to Impress me?"

 _We are together._

"Second Impressions do not happen -- they're not a good idea." Daniel rubbed the heel of his hand over his forehead, trying to negotiate with a dragon. "There is no life after -- "

Daniel felt a wave of pain and saw Sharee, but knew that he was feeling the loss of S'ra. "Stop. Those memories are not good for us." Instinctively, Daniel pushed himself against Jacketh's foreleg. Instantly the great head lowered, so that Daniel could give proper attention to eye ridges. There were things that he should be doing or saying, but in the end this was right.

 _We have been together, haven't we?_

 _Since you told me to stay._

"Since I told you to stay?" But then Daniel could feel the moment, divorced from the pain that had surrounded it.

 _I could not go back into a shell. You understand here -- we are together._

"Of course you couldn't grow another shell -- although you did a pretty good job with the dirt. You need to bathe."

 _I need to eat._ Jacketh bent his foreleg so that Daniel could mount.

 _Do you need me to go with you to the feeding grounds?_

 _It is tradition, but you should ignore any advice to limit my appetite._

Daniel sucked in a breath, but then smiled. Without further hesitation, he climbed onto Jacketh's neck.

 _You need to slide back one neck ridge._

Daniel nodded and did as instructed, gripping what was left of the fighting straps and wondering if they would hold as far as the feeding grounds.

 _I would never drop you._

Daniel knew that that was true, and that he would never feel the loneliness of the last year ever again.

"A craft master cannot Impress a dragon!" someone shouted, loud enough to break through Daniel's reverie.

Jacketh laughed that impossible laugh, filling Daniel's head. _Then it is probably a good thing that you Impressed me!_

~end~

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Actual prompt - _Crossover with McCaffrey's Pern. First mating flight ever between two bronzes or between a bronze and a green/brown/whatever-works-for-Daniel, Jack being the bronze rider, Daniel the other._
> 
> Words I actually worked with - Jack, Daniel, Pern, bronze dragon, whatever-works-for-Daniel
> 
> A/N: Written for the [](http://jd-ficathon.dreamwidth.org/profile)[**jd_ficathon**](http://jd-ficathon.dreamwidth.org/) Promptathon. Many, many thanks to [](http://paian.dreamwidth.org/profile)[**paian**](http://paian.dreamwidth.org/) for her thorough and much needed beta skills. Of course, this crack!and everything in it are my fault.


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